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Shaolin-Taijiquan Course - Part 7

8th to 14th October 2009, Penang

Sharing Some Secrets

One-Finger Shooting Zen

Zhang Wuji

Sifu Zhang Wuji - Instructor, Shaolin Wahnam Singapore

20th October 2009

Sharing Some Secrets

I know everyone is waiting for Day 2, so let's not waste time.

The session began in, of all places, a KTV lounge called Memories, which was fortunately empty at that time of er, shall we say, worldly distractions. The first thing we did was One Finger Shooting Zen (OFZ). Again, to anyone who has been for an intensive or Special course, it may seem like we were traversing old ground. But one had to be there to appreciate how doing the "same old thing" can be so refreshing. For one thing, we had all been doing OFZ for a long time, and Sifu was there to correct the fine points. There were many subtle variations among the instructors and as I recall, Sifu did not correct those variations. Could it be that the practice of OFZ is manifested differently in each practitioner?

I would like to share some fine points, even though these are secrets, the reason being that some of our students may be practising OFZ without supervision and making a few very common mistakes. I know this for a fact because some of my own students were making those mistakes even after I alerted them. The first is that a gentle thought of the qi movement or just being aware is sufficient. Do not make the mistake of actively visualising the qi flowing from the source to the finger, or chasing the sensation of the qi flow. The second key point is to make the appropriate sound gently and not forcefully imagine the sound coming from the particular organ.

James fells Andy using the pattern "Lead Horse Back to Stable"

In our Shaolin Cosmos qigong, there is no need for such visualisation - remember, our key word is "gently". In Sifu' own words, be gently aware, and from visualising, you simply realise. Finally, the OFZ is not piercing forcefully; doing so would go against the essence of the exercise. For elaboration of the fine points, do check in with your instructors if you are interested - they cannot be communicated by the written word.

After that, we reviewed the kicking and felling sequences. Again, the fun was in making variations of our counters, this time to kicks. I must thank my sparring partners for slowing down, and re-doing the sequences as I tried out new counters.

Sifu reminded us of an important principle when countering a felling technique (he also mentioned this the previous day). "To lose the stance but not the waist" (?????) I am not sure how much I should say about this principle, so let me leave it at that for now.

And Josh, taming and covering were covered on both Day 1 and 2 - no wonder you are confused. I had to check my notes and the DVDs to make sure myself. I will go into that in my next post.